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Departmental Handbook

Commercial Games

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Commercial Games


Languages games can be used in class, but the kids will probably not play these at home. Instead, they will be more attracted to MMORPG games. The most popular of these games is World of Warcraft, which is played online.

external image 256px-WoW_Box_Art1.jpg

The beauty of WOW (World of Warcraft) is that it can be played on different servers, either in English, French, German or Spanish.
The player choses a faction (the Alliance or the Horde) and creates an avatar (character) of a specific class (hunter, warrior, priest, mage, paladin, warlock, druid or shaman).

Once the avatar is created, the player needs to complete quests and kill monsters to gain experience and level up. The higher the level, the more powerful the character.

Up to a certain level, the player can complete quests on his own, but after a while, will need to visit dungeons which can only be done in groups of 5 or more. And that's when the language learning starts! The players will have to communicate via a chat (Writing and Reading practice) or TeamSpeak (Speaking and Listening practice) to cooperate in the killing of a monster.

The player can also belong to a guild (a group of players playing together and cooperating in the completion of quests) and get the feeling of belonging. Guild members usually have 2 professions whereby they can provide items to other players (or sell them in the WOW Auction House), which can show some enterprising qualities.

The downside of WOW is that players usually use abreviations and jargon on the chat, which could teach pupils a language not (yet) accepted by the SQA . However, they get the opportunity to learn the language with a purpose, and communicate with real people (behind their avatar) of the real country.

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